Divorce's bright side

CHICAGO  A recent survey by OppenheimerFunds Inc. of women age 55 and older showed that divorcees and widows were more financially comfortable than when they were married.

The New York-based company conducted a phone survey this past summer of 600 women who had a minimum of $500,000 in investible assets. The company interviewed 200 married women, 200 divorced women and 200 widows. The survey showed that 68 percent of divorcees and 65 percent of widows said that their level of financial comfort was higher than when they were married.

Of the respondents, 78 percent said they were happy with their advisers, and 43 percent said they expected to rely more on financial professionals. Sixty-six percent said that their advisers showed an appropriate level of respect to female investors.

According to the study, 63 percent of divorced women and 51 percent of widowed participants said they switched financial advisers at some point, and about half attributed the switch to a lack of knowledge, experience or service on the advisers' part.

"The more we survey women, the more we find they're comfortable with investing," said Donna Winn, president and chief executive with OFI Private Investments Inc. in New York, a subsidiary of OppenheimerFunds.

"Women are comfortable making decisions on their own," she said. "They rely on financial advisers, which we think is good."

Winn said OppenheimerFunds officials plan to share the survey results with advisers.

"Oppenheimer is always committed to women investing. What we try to do is regularly poll women and find out what different things they're interested in, compared to the traditional investor," Winn said.